EXCITING DAYS IN DESERT

Dominion, Volume 34, Issue 81, 30 December 1940, Page 7

EXCITING DAYS IN DESERT

N.Z. Drivers’ Stories ENEMY AWED BY SIGHT OF TRUCKS Events In Fighting Line (Fbom Ths Oi'iiciai. Wai: Coiikesi'ondent Attached To 'The N.Z.E.F. In Tire Middle East.) WESTERN DESERT, Dec. 27. The most exciting days they have known were described in vivid detail today by New Zealand truck drivers who returned from the front for a brief stay at their headquarters in a quiet bay somewhere along the Mediterranean coast. They are members ol operating sections of the reserve motor transport company, A.S.C., whose trucks carried English and Indian troops into the battle that rid Egypt of the Italian armed forces. Nearly 230 drivers and reliefs and officers in three fleets of heavy lorries took the assaulting parties to the very gates of the enemy positions in Sidi Barrani area.

It is now confirmed that several of them decided on the spur of the moment to take an even more direct part in the offensive, following charging ’infantrymen into positions of the enemy and helping to round up the surprised enemy troops. Admittedly their action was irregular, but undeniably it was splendid. In addition they were forced time after time to seek shelter behind the wheels of their trucks or in trenches from bursting shells and bombs and a rain of fire from machine-gun nests and aircraft. It is believed that one driver, tiring a Bren gun from Ids shoulder, brought down a diving Italian machine. Yet they suffered only one casualty, a driver who was hurt, but not seriously, when his truck ran over a landmine. Intense cold and continual sandstorms were experienced during the several days and nights spent by the drivers in the front line.

'flie events moved so swiftly that they find it difficult to retrace thorn chronologically. One said his first thought after the troops had gone into action was to make a mug of tea, and it was not till shots whistled overhead as lie was doing this that lie fully realized his closeness to ba tile. Grenades Thrown from Trucks. All agreed that tire element of complete surprise made for the swift victory. Even the sight of the big New Zealand trucks, some of which were mistaken for tanks by the startled enemy soldiers, seemed to have had a demoralizing effect. Incredibly enough, the men obtained adequate sleep. The most exhausting phase of their task was an all-night return journey with prisoners. They are now continuing their work of carrying supplies to the British forces across the border. Ono driver described how his section loaded Indian troops and spent the first night in the open some GO miles from the enemy. On the next day the troops practised debussing while the drivers were shown maps of the enemy camps and told how to make an entrance. They then moved up unseen and unheard to a bivouac about eight miles from and almost behind the objectives. Italian pilots flow overhead unsuspecting. “One of our sections went in at dawn, and their camp was falling as my section passed later in the <hry,” the driver said. “Things got pretty hot when shellfire came our way, and we steered clear to reach'our own objective. When the leading trucks almost ran into machine-gun nests the Indians stood up and threw 'in hand grenades. “We went right, alongside the outer tank traps, where some of our trucks met a number of tanks whose crews seemed to be so spellbound that they could not hit us. The Indian troops piled out and quite a few of our drivers hopped into the scrap with them. It was some hours before all the prisoners were rounded up. Under Artillery Fire. “During the night, which was spent in the same camp, a crowd of Italians came from another position and took a few shots at us, but not enough to 4 worry about. Next day we took the Indians to another camp. We were not there half an hour when artillery opened on to us from somewhere else. Believe me, it was pretty warm, and I dived for a hole. I landed on two Libyans who had beaten me with the same idea.

“We were under shellfire for more than an hour. When we moved to still another camp a few planes tried to machine-gun us, and I got about 15 shots away at them. There was no stopping the Indians and this camp fell like the rest.

“After spending the night there we had the. uncanny experience of shellfire from British guns sailing over our heads toward some other position. When the area was finally cleaned up we set out for Solium, but word was received that no useful Italians were left in Egypt. We spent the next two or three days carting prisoners before returning to the job of transporting supplies.”